There may be some confusion in East Haven this morning about where to vote, as some folks went to the wrong polling place and did not feel they were properly notified about the change.

Also getting reports of polling place in Middletown where the moderator was allegedly allowing voters to choose Republican or Democratic ballots, regardless of Party Affiliation.  We are checking it out.

Post any ancedotes you wish about turnout, etc, below.

Update 1:24pm: Reports are of heavy turnouts in both Parties, with the Democrats trending significantly higher.  Some towns are reporting 2-1 Dem to GOP.  Unsurprising, as Senator McCain increasingly takes on the role of “presumptive nominee”, while the Democrat fight is neck-and-neck.  Also since 1976, with the exception of 1980, turnout is always higher in the primaries for the “out of power” party.

Also, we checked on the Middletown thing.  The officials there say that they have not had any such reports and all procedures are being followed correctly.

The Hartford Courant is reporting that Senator John McCain will be making a campaign stop in Connecticut this coming Sunday at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield.Details have not been released, but Headless Horseman is reporting that the appearance will begin around 1 PM.

Update by Heath, 3:41pm:

Senator John McCain will visit Connecticut on Sunday, February 3rd at 1pm at Sacred Heart University in Fairfield.  Senator McCain will be joined by Lt. Governor Mike Fedele, Senator Joe Lieberman, Representative Chris Shays, former Congressman Rob Simmons, State Senator Tony Guglielmo and - possibly - Governor Jodi Rell. 

The “Super Bowl Sunday” campaign stop will be at the University Commons, 5151 Park Avenue in Fairfield.

In further John McCain news, he was endorsed today by New London’s The Day newspaper. The paper’s summation on McCain:

This newspaper believes that a general election campaign pitting Sen. Barack Obama, whom The Day endorses in the Democratic primary, against Sen. McCain would be conducted at a high level, focused on the issues and free of the dirty tricks that have become part and parcel of our presidential elections.

Connecticut Governor M. Jodi Rell is announcing her endorsement for Arizona Republican Senator John McCain at this hour.  With just over a week before Connecticut Republicans head to the polls to vote in Connecticut’s Presidential Preference Primary, this long-awaited endorsement will certainly bolster the Arizonan’s campaign.

Pictured above from 2006 with then-Congressman Rob Simmons, McCain has been a regular visitor to the Nutmeg State for Reps. Simmons, Johnson, Shays each time they were up for re-election, as well as Governor Rell in 2006.  McCain is polling extremely well in Connecticut, with the recently reported UCONN/Hartford Courant poll putting McCain at 39% in the state, well ahead of his rival Presidential candidates.  Many observers, of course, will remember that McCain won CT in 2000, defeating then-Governor George W. Bush.

 Update: Lt. Governor Michael Fedele has also endorsed Senator McCain.

It’s Election Day in New Hampshire. 

Amid all the chatter and blather about the Iowa caucuses last week and the New Hampshire primary today, it is important to remember just what it is all about.  The purpose of the primary process is for a POTUS candidate to collect enough delegates to the Republican National Convention to receive the Presidential nomination.  In a recent post here, I indicated that we are going to start tracking delegate counts and reporting on them regularly.  After initially visiting MSNBC and reporting those numbers, newlondoncalling commented that CNN had different counts.  Curious, I launched a closer investigation of the matter and quickly discovered that there are a whole bunch of different numbers floating around out there.  At that point, it was time to go to the source - the Republican National Committee.  The results: 2380 delegates were allocated to the national convention. The eventual nominee will need the votes of national convention delegates totaling 50% + 1 in order to be the nominee. Based upon the 2380 delegates allocated, the eventual nominee will need 1191 delegates in order to gain the nomination.

Furthermore, the delegates from Iowa are actually “unbound”, meaning that they can vote for whomever they choose at the Convention, though they are generally elected to be delegates based on their support for certain candidates.  So, other than the media bounce, it is too early for Governor Huckabee to count any delegates in his column.  In Wyoming, the caucus claimed as a victory for Governor Mitt Romney of Massachusetts isn’t much of a victory after all, as all 14 delegates from that state are unbound.  As a matter of fact, the New Hampshire delegates up for grabs today will be the first 12 “bound” votes of the entire process - and even then, the delegates will be divided proportionally amongst all of the candidates garnering a threshold 10% of the vote.

What does this all mean?  The value of the “beauty contest” exceeds the actual balloting contest that will occur at the Republican National Convention on Sept 1 -4 in Minneapolis.  Nonetheless, we will continue tracking the head counts during the course of the process.

Word came late yesterday that the Democratic candidate in the special election for the 32nd Senate District, Kenny Curran, has qualified for Citizens Election Program funding.  Coming more than two weeks after his Republican opponent Rob Kane qualified, Curran’s campaign may be crunched by the tight calendar.  The special election is set for January 15.

The new Citizens’ Election Program is a public financing system implemented by the legislature and signed by Governor Rell in 2005.  During the course of a general election, candidates for State Senate will be required to meet two thresholds to qualify for public financing - 300 donors from towns touched by the Senate District and $15,000 raised in increments of between $5 - $100.  Upon qualifying, the CEP grant for State Senate is $85,000.  In the case of the special election, Kane and Curran each needed to raise $11,250 and have 225 in-district contributors, to receive the grant of $63,750.  Any money not used at the end of the campaign will go back into the Citizens Election Program to be doled out to future campaigns.

Both candidates have posted websites, found at www.robkaneforsenate.com and www.kenforsenate.com.  Voters in the 32nd District can learn more about the two candidates at these sites.  You can also read about Rob Kane at his campaign blog, http://www.robkaneforsenate.blogspot.com.